Ireland + Britain - Stalling on Immigration

international | eu | news report

Friday February 13, 2004 21:01

by Fergus

A week after the appearance of the front page headline - 'Ireland now only EU state Not to Restrict Access', yesterday, the Irish Times published a smaller less obvious story.

Other stories will be even harder to find...

A week after the appearance of the front page headline - 'Ireland now only EU state Not to Restrict Access', yesterday, the Irish Times published a smaller less obvious story.

Last Thursday (5th Feb.) the paper stated that "Britain thus becomes the 14th of the 15 existing member states to exercise their right under the accession treaties to restrict immigration..."

However in yesterdays smaller less obvious article (12th Feb.) it quoted Britain's PM Tony Blair as saying -
"There is free movement of people after May 1st.
"Free movement of workers, however, was a concession we are prepared to grant but not in circumstances where it can be abused.
We are therefore LOOKING at the benefits system and any other measures necessary to ensure it is not abused."

A report of the issue in yesterdays Guardian newspaper pointed out that -
'The result of a belated policy review, initially expected yesterday, has been DELAYED until next week at the earliest.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,1146736,00.html

Now, despite its (5th Feb.) suspect headline allegations, last weeks Irish Times article also included an admission by an Irish government spokesman that -
"IF there were strong indications that the Irish welfare system would become overburdened, then it MAY BE necessary to put in place restrictions."

Ireland and Britain's position are the same.
IE - they are both stalling on the immigration issue.
In particular on IF/WHEN they are going to introduce restrictions on Social Welfare.

An Extract from the Experts

Talking on an RTE Radio 1 feature on May 1st enlargement , "one of Ireland's leading economists" made claims that -

"We are exposed to possibilities that could be very serious for the govt. and society, thats absolutely true.

The difficulty is this - that we're in this community , there is a set of rules, which means that we must abide by them, we have a liberal social welfare regime, we are also constitutionally bound in terms of immigration by the Good Friday Agreement and we now find ourselves with people coming in, possibly looking for social welfare, and we will have a choice between either accommodating them or changing the rules for social welfare for EVERYBODY.
Now there will be some people and I will be one of those saying maybe we should contemplate that.
But if we don't contemplate that then we simply have to bite this bullet"

>So are you saying if there's a wave of immigration into the State on May 1st and social welfare rules have to be changed, they'll be changed for everybody ?

"They'll have to be, you can't discriminate".

>Everybody ? You can't discriminate ?

"You can't discriminate, no. How are you going to discriminate ?"

>So the threat to social welfare is even stronger then ?

"Something will have to give. There's no doubt about that."

Tom McGurk discusses the possible outcomes of EU enlargement with UCD economist, Moore McDowell on The Sunday Show (8th Feb.)

The above comments can be found (?) at around 1 hour 8 minutes into the programme.
Scroll down and click on 'The Sunday Show'.
http://www.rte.ie/radio1/infocenter/audio_weekend.html

Moore McDowell is a UCD economist, a columnist with the Irish Independent and is often a guest panelist on RTE Radio/television, - by the way he is also the brother of Attorney General, Michael McDowell.

Where's This Coming From ?

Immigration policy can't be looked at in isolation.
Europe is changing, government + business want to push through reforms in the relationship between "the welfare state" and "the labour market".

http://www.upmf-grenoble.fr/irepd/regulation/Forum/Forum_2003/Forumpdf/RR_RAVEAUD.pdf

Bigger EU Questions

Are Ireland and Britain both stalling on a decision because they want to wait until after May 1st enlargement ?
It would then mean that the introduction of reforms/cuts to Social Welfare would effect EVERYBODY ?
That way they can get to blame not EU reforms but the "welfare tourists" and "scroungers".

And what decent member of society wants to defend the unemployed, "welfare tourists" and "scroungers" ?

Let them drown ?

Not without a struggle.

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Comments (6 of 6)

Public Service Broadcasting

Sat Feb 14, 2004 18:22

Excuse me,
I was having technical difficulties with it playing last night.
The radio comments I've quoted can actually be found at - 1 hr 12 minutes into the programme.

The silence is deafening

Sun Feb 15, 2004 18:58

newsforthedeaf at yahoo dot com

[The above Sunday Show link from last week will soon be replaced by todays show - so heres a few other quotes before they disappear] -

>This depends on the number of people who come, with a huge number we could have problems ?

"Of course people will come, but if the word gets back that there is no housing that there are queues for everything, that you can't get anything then that word will certainly choke off the flow of immigration. So you know I would see this as something, I you eh... there are two problems, clearly there is a social welfare problem but we should see it in terms of attracting investment"

[later in the interview]

"Now I think there is a problem with social welfare, but given both the... political commitment to the EU and what I would regard as our social consensus in this country, we have decided that we... we have in fact a fairly liberal social welfare regime, we don't require people to be unemployed for 6 months before they get the dole and things like that and WHEN we have that, if we are members of the EU... I've grave reservations about Nice, didn't approve or vote for it, but we're in thems the rules and you can't change them."

[Don't you just love the way he changes the subject ?]

PS

[In a previous Radio 1 interview, Moore McDowell is also quoted as telling Joe Duffy.]

"Its you're job to emote, it's my job to think"

[Remember - people aren't people - these days they're just another commodity.]

Making the Link

Sun Feb 15, 2004 19:28

Its tough going, but if you follow the above "Where's this coming from ?" link and scroll down to around page 7 you'll find -

"One of the great 'tricks' (...) of neo classical economics is to treat labour like any other factor of production." (Stiglitz, 2002 p10)

Also

In short the mantra of increased labour market flexibility [is] only a thinly disguised attempt to roll back - under the guise of "economic efficiency" - gains that workers had achieved over years and years of bargaining and political activity (Stiglitz, 2002 p13)

Joesph Stiglitz, former chief economist of the World Bank.
In 1999 the World Bank fired Stiglitz, merely for seeking to study why IMF policies failed so often.
In Sept. 2001, he was awarded the Noble Prize in economics.

Is Social Welfare also one of the "gains that workers had achieved over years and years of bargaining and political activity" ?

Re. Fergus's comments

by hurler on the ditch

Sun Feb 15, 2004 19:43

For anyone who may be interested, the full version of the Stiglitz article referred to by Fergus is available in PDF format at the link given here.

Oi Tony ! Wots your game ?

Mon Feb 16, 2004 19:49

Another piece of the wigsaj, no sigjaw, eh... jigsaw.

Ripped straight from 'The Business' 15/16 Feb.

Tony Blair is working on a policy that would deny British welfare benefits to members of new EU states until they find a permanent job in Britain and start paying taxes.
The PM is taking advice on the legality of a proposal that would allow free access to the labour market .... but restrict access to welfare.
The proposals are primarily intended to allay growing public concern about "welfare tourists" ...
Blair has spent the past fortnight under pressure to review his promise of free access... - something being denied to them by every other EU country except Ireland.
UK officials have researched the option of denying welfare to anyone who has not lived in Britain for at least two years or inventing a new work permit that would restrict benefit entitlement.

BUT the European Commission has told 10 D[R]owning Street both options would be illegal; and that Britain must either accept workers as full citizens or join mainland Europe in denying them work permits for up to seven years.

Rather than backtrack on his original pledge... Blair hopes to make welfare entitlement conditional on finding a job. This, officials believe, is an equitable offer that opens the labour market and honours EU law.
Officials... have repeatedly delayed announcing it until they can be sure the scheme is legally watertight.

Number 10 has been advised by the European Commission that it is illegal to grant "work only" status to migrants and asking them to pay taxes while denying use of the NHS and unemployment benefit.

Blair wants to get around this by demanding that such welfare is conditional on a social security number. There may also be a minimum work limit, to stop migrants being employed for a day then claiming the right to remain.
As a final measure, Blair will make clear that the UK parliament can introduce rapid legislation revoking the right to work in Britain if migration becomes a problem.

Correction

Wed Feb 18, 2004 20:41

Moore is the brother of Michael McDowell who is currently Minister for Justice.

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Ireland + Britain - Stalling on Immigration

Comments (6 of 6)